So its not that premature. By the time they annouce and finally release a PS5 it’ll probably be 6 years which is a little over average console lifespan. It does feel a little shorter, something i am putting down to a very lacklustre first 2-3 years but also down to the XBone failing so hard

usually consoles enter the end of their lifecycle once new product gets going.

this feels really rushed, given that ps4 is not doing half bad.

i think they are trying to maintain backwards compatibilty while escaping from the console hackers catching up. and to get their hardware current with gaming demands again. the introduction of vr, 4k and hdr forced a rushed re-release of gaming consoles with specs to match that demand.

there are news of sony devs implementing new amd based architecture support in llvm, so there is something going on indeed.

Sony just bought the remaining part of EMI that they didn’t own. They’ll probably stop making TV’s next year. Then Cameras etc.

TVs, I agree, but isn’t Sony’s camera/imaging division highly profitable? Their cameras seem to be hot amongst the various photography sites (and Amazon sales charts) for the last 2-3 years. Their 1″, APS-C and Full-Frame sensors are also inside almost every competing brand of prosumer/professional camera out there aside from Canon. That and their small sensors are in virtually every mid/high-end smartphone in the market. They’ve also got dedicated video offerings that seem to be doing well.

On topic, I doesn’t seem all that surprising, seeing as the PS4 is mostly PC hardware. I’d wager the PS5 (or whatever they call it) will probably be backward compatible with PS4/Pro games.

Sales peaked, interest falls. Some people replace their console or just buy in with the slightly better Pro version,but that won’t change the trends.

I am also a late adopter, though I bought a slim only. In my view the ecosystem is very healthy, there are great discounts, great upcoming games, and reaching the last phase just means that the new console should appear by 2020 Christmas which seems realistic.

In terms of time frames, till the PS5 Pro is released, Thom, you have about 5 more years, so I don’t understand what do you feel premature on this whole thing? You will have a very mature game selection while early PS5 titles will coexist on PS4 platform too, and you get the slightly better experiment you paid for.

Don’t worry. It means they are in “the hardware is now cheap and we have a big installed base so we can actually make money on game licenses”-phase.

The PS5 will probably not come out until end of 2020, maybe even 2021.

The PS2 was released five years after the PS (1995 – 2000)*

The PS3 was released six years after the PS2 (2000 – 2006)

The PS3 was release seven years after the PS3 (2006 – 2013)

Following this trend the PS5 should come in 2021. And with the mid-generation resets (PS4 Pro and Xbone X) it’s very probably that Sony will try and extend the most profitable phase of the console lifecycle as much as possible.

However the current generation of consoles has a hard time competing with the PC in the FPS department due to the weak CPUs.

Also now that the consoles use x86 hardware and are likely to continue that trend, it’s very probable the next generation will be fully backwards compatible with this generation of games, which means that Sony doesn’t have to worry about impacting sales of the PS4 games if they release the PS5 in 2020. I think updates to console hardware from now on is going to be comparable to how smart phone updates work, but with a 4 year lifecycle.

Honestly got annoyed with the Wii having services disabled; time for the PS4 to follow suite.

Given I’m still able to run my NES games to their fullest, but not the Wii games I’ll probably not go for the Switch either – the only way the console makers will learn to make the games so that users can run them without them is by folks not going for the consoles.

Sadly there’s probably too many gamers that will do it irregardless for simply the sake of gaming to make a difference.